Alliance

Travis Perkins PLC
20 July 2000



                    Travis Perkins in e-commerce partnership
                                with Emap Digital

Travis Perkins, one  of  the UK's leading suppliers of timber and building
materials, has signed a partnership agreement with Emap Digital's 'Construction
Plus', a  widely visited UK construction industry website,  to extend the
availability of its products via the net.

The agreement will enable customers to purchase a wide range of building
materials from Travis Perkins through the Construction Intelligence buying  tool
(http://www.constructionintelligence.com). Emap has a strong presence in  the
offline construction industry through its extensive portfolio  of  construction
media, including the Architects' Journal, Construction News, New Civil Engineer,
Interbuild and Glenigan.

For Travis Perkins the agreement builds on its already well established
e-commerce capabilities. These include the following initiatives:

Tradesite  -  an area of the travisperkins.co.uk site and in operation  for  the
last  four years, it allows credit account holders to: access pre-agreed prices;
check  account balances, copy invoices and statements; view electronic catalogue
information  and  branch  locations; as well as obtain  information  on current
promotions.

Fully e-commerce enabled, this site lets customers order any of the complete
range of over 100,000 items online 24 hours a day.  Orders are routed
electronically direct to the chosen branch for either collection or delivery.

Keysite  -  a similar area of the Keyline.co.uk site providing the same 
functionality for Keyline customers as Tradesite does for the Travis Perkins
customer base.

Craftpak.co.uk  -  primarily aimed at schools and providing school packs plus
individual items of timber craftwork materials for use in the workshop.

Toolmart.co.uk  - information on the range and pricing of tools from over 130
Travis Perkins, tool hire centres around the country together with locations.

Frank J. McKay, chief executive of Travis Perkins, commented. 'The agreement is
a further logical step in the development of our e-commerce strategy which will
continue to evolve in the best interests of our customers' needs and
preferences.

'We are all the time refining the functionality of our websites and are also
developing additional focused sites to target specific segments of the building
materials market.

'These existing activities together with the Emap Digital link put us in a
strong position to capitalise on the growing opportunities for e-commerce in the
building materials industry.'

Press Enquiries:

Dr. Ian R. Goldsmith                         Ross Sturley
Director of Strategic Planning               Marketing Director
Travis Perkins plc                           Construction Plus
Tel: [phone]                            Tel: [phone]